Imperial Service Medal GVI

My example is an GVI ISM named to Agnes Beirne. Agnes was the Assistant Supervisor at the Post Office in Belfast. Her medal was gazetted on the 25th of September 1951.

The Imperial Service Order was established by King Edward VII in August 1902. It was awarded on retirement to the administration and clerical staff of the Civil Service throughout the British Empire for long and meritorious service.

Normally a person must have served for 25 years to become eligible, but this might be shortened to 16 years for those serving in unsanitary locations. There was one class: Companion. Both men and women were eligible, and recipients of this order are entitled to use the post-nominal letters ‘ISO’.

Non-managerial civil servants who complete 25 years service are eligible for the Imperial Service Medal (ISM) upon retirement. The medal is a silver circular medal bearing the effigy of the reigning monarch on the obverse, and the motif of a naked man resting after work with the legend ‘For Faithful Service’ on the reverse. The ribbon or bow pattern is the same as the Imperial Service Order.